Let Go and Be Free
Discover tips on self-healing, overcome a dysfunctional childhood and find happiness.
There will be days when you will want to give up and feel weak and tired. There will be times when you are looking at the changes in your life and question whether you are on the right path.
As kids, we had hardships and experienced difficult times from our alcoholic and dysfunctional upbringings. We often carry a lot of guilt, pain, and fear that are triggered when we encounter difficult times in the present.
It’s much easier to be happy and content when life is going well. When we hit a bump in the road, it’s harder to be positive and to have hope.
Last night I learned that the social distance recommendations to stop the spread of the Coronavirus have been extended until April 30th. That’s four additional weeks of remaining at home, schools, and places of employment closed along with seeing the harrowing stories of those who are sick and how many people have lost their lives.
All my life, I have prioritized work, responsibility, and made sacrifices to be intentional about my day. But you know what? I’ve not made enough time to laugh, play, and have fun.
When I do have free time, I fill it up with chores, work around the house, writing my next book, pretty much anything but taking time to have fun.
If there is one lesson that I wish I would have learned earlier in life, it’s this: Love yourself.
I sought to complete myself in relationships, threw myself into work, and writing, but I didn’t spend the time to focus on myself. I loved myself enough, but I wasn’t in love with me. I mistakenly thought that to be satisfied and complete in life that I needed to fall in love with someone else. And when I did meet someone, I’d spend all my energy into building up the relationship but stopped work on myself and spending time with friends and family.
As a kid, life would happen to me, and I would get dragged along into whatever happened within my family. Divorces, family arguments, money problems, they all affected me, and I had no way to protect myself from any of those changes.
Today I had a chance to talk with my daughter and ask her how she was feeling about the Coronavirus pandemic. As I write this, my family and I are sheltering in place in our home still as per our governor’s orders.
The more we live in the past, the more that we’ll be trapped and stagnate.
The tricky thing about growing up in an alcoholic family is that we tend to repeat the past. What do I mean?
If we fear abandonment, we might choose partners who are not physically or emotionally present for us? We crave to try and solve the abandonment issues of our past by trying to solve that same issue in our present.
Have you ever gotten angry or lashed out at someone you love, and the reason didn’t have anything to do with them?
Maybe you’ve been bottling up or repressing anger from another part of your life: Frustration about your work, your financial situation, or your health?
If you have, don’t worry, I’ve been there.
I went on a long run this morning, and although spring, it was cold outside. I had my winter gear on and ran on my normal 9-mile route as I tried not to think about the Coronavirus and the impact the virus was having on the world.
When problems surround us, do we withdraw from the world, or do we work to be a beacon of light in the dark?
As a kid, my grandfather often told me to become a doctor or a lawyer. He had the best intentions, but his worldview and mine never did match up. In college, I had an opportunity to study in Paris for three weeks as part of a summer abroad program. I needed $5000 dollars even after earning a $500 scholarship for my good grades.
Today marks the first full week that my kids’ schools are closed due to the Coronavirus and that I’m working from home. Each day I turn on the TV and the news is worse. I’ve written about the power of writing in a journal and how it can be like a time capsule.
Today the entire state of California has gone into lockdown. The governor has asked all Californians to stay at home and has banned gatherings. The order affects 40 million people. In Pennsylvania, Governor Wolf has ordered that all businesses that are not “life-sustaining” to shutdown.
I read a Washington Post article on Sinead O’Connor yesterday that stuck with me. If you’re not familiar with the Irish singer, she became famous with her hit “Nothing Compares 2 U.” (Prince wrote the song and O’Connor’s rendition is heartbreaking.) But her stardom took a turn in 1992 when she sang on Saturday Night Live, and on live television, she tore up a photo of the Pope and said, “Fight the real enemy.”
Many years now have passed, and O’Connor has struggled with depression and medical problems that sometimes swirl up in the news. The Post article allows her to tell her story, and she opens up about the abuse that her devout Irish Catholic mother inflicted on her. Her mother would physically beat her while she was naked, and the trauma has stayed with O’Connor for decades after her mother died.
